Studio Ellipsis
is seeking a Combat Game Designer to help refine and balance the core
systems of our third-person action title. This is a hands-on, systems-driven role for
someone who thrives on iteration, precision, and feel: Translating high-level design direction
into tuned, deterministic gameplay that rewards mastery.
You will work alongside a small, senior team to evolve our combat model into something
elegant, readable, and endlessly replayable, grounded in player skill.
What You'll Do
* Implement, tune, and balance combat systems, weapons, abilities & enemy
behaviors.
* Own the feel of combat: responsiveness, hit timing, recovery, rhythm, etc.
* Calibrate interactions between player mechanics, AI logic, and camera to achieve a
clean, deterministic combat model.
* Maintain and evolve combat parameters: damage curves, stamina systems, tracking
logic, invulnerability frames, and cooldowns.
* Build, document, and maintain data-driven balance frameworks for PvE and PvP
encounters.
* Partner with Animation, Engineering, and AI teams to refine movement fidelity, impact
feedback, and rhythm.
* Analyze playtest data and player telemetry to validate tuning, surface edge cases,
and evolve the meta.
* Ensure every weapon, archetype, and enemy type has a distinct combat identity and
tactical role.
What You Bring
* 5+ years of experience in combat or systems design for 3rd-person or action titles
(PvE and/or PvP).
* Deep understanding of melee and ranged combat design fundamentals —
spacing, timing, recovery, and player feedback.
* Proven ability to tune deterministic combat systems for balance and consistency
across latency and skill tiers.
* Strong grasp of camera, lock-on, targeting, and animation-driven gameplay.
* Experience with combat data management: tuning tables, curves, and debug
visualization.
* Fluent in Unreal Engine (Blueprints, DataTables, tuning workflows).
* Analytical mindset — able to diagnose subtle feel issues through metrics and
iteration.
* Comfortable working within clear design direction and taking ownership of
executional detail.
* Experience designing and implementing gameplay systems in Unreal Engine.
* Shipped at least one game using Unreal Engine.
Bonus
* Experience creating PvPvE or extraction-based combat ecosystems.
* Knowledge of AI behavior trees, modular encounter systems, or systemic
combat scaling.
* Understanding of competitive tuning and meta evolution in skill-based games.
* Background in combat animation timing, root motion, or motion matching.
* Familiarity with the Lyra Gameplay Ability System (GAS) and its application to
multiplayer.
About Studio Ellipsis
Studio Ellipsis is a Lisbon-based collective of senior developers crafting genre-defining experiences that fuse precision, mood, and mastery. We believe small, focused teams and elegant systems can create worlds larger than life.
If you care deeply about
feel
,
timing
, and
clarity
, and you want to build combat that's elegant, deep, and endlessly replayable: we want to meet you.